kevinbr writes "Napster has concluded that PC-based music subscriptions aren't a growth business ... because it's retreating from its core business. 'Six months ago the subscription music service had 830,000 subs, three months ago it had 770,000, and now it has 750,000. The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer. But it's not as if those numbers will swell this fall: NAPS projects only a 4% revenue increase for next quarter. So instead of talking up its core subscription business, Napster is now pinning its hopes on the mobile industry. Music on your cellphone may one day be a real business, but hard to see why Napster is going to be the company that will capitalize on it.'"
Music subscriptions aren't valuable? What a revelation. Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form.
Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service.
Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.
Sirus had to buy XM because two companies in the sat. radio business was one too many. there just aren't enough people willing to pay for radio.
Subscriptions in many cases aren't valuable to the end user, as you take music with you, yet video's aren't very useful while driving down the road.
You subscribe to a newspaper as it changes every day. You subscribe to TV as you have to sit down and watch it. How many people sit down and just listen to music?
Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.
I was specifically referring to music subscription services. There is a much more popular alternative to music download subscription services - iTMS - and it succeeds where these services fail. If there were only music subscription services available and no iTMS, they would much more popular. But the fact is people don't like paying monthly fees for services, yet they will if there's a lack of competition in a given market. I'd prefer not to pay any monthly fees for many common consumer items, but I end up
the fact is people don't like paying monthly fees for services
I am having trouble parsing your words "fail". The vast bulk of the media marketplace in the United States and even the world is based on subscription revenue. Compared with these, Apple's revenue from single-licence sales is a blip. It's big when considered against the declining revenues of the other single-charge retailers who usually package their content onto plastic disks, but it's still a very slow growing market, subject to random, huge di
I hope you can see the difference between constantly getting content for your viewing (and recording), and not being able to use those records anymore when you cancel the subscription, yes?
The DRM is how they trap subscribers, I think. Notice this part of the article:
The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer.
That's because the college students at schools Napster has agreements with (no doubt by scaring them with file-sharing legal FUD) are FORCED to pay for a Napster subscription as a part of their technology fees and since they don't take classes during the summer, those subscriptions stop. It's not because they stop using the service, it's because they don't have to pay for it anymore. And the small percentage who used the
I think attitude is presented by people that don't understand it.
Nobody claimed that you were buying music. Music subscriptions offers you legal access to more music than you can possibly buy with the same amount of money per month in your lifetime.
If you want subscriptions where you keep your tracks, then eMusic is the way to go, but that limits you to about 30 tracks a month.
Actually, the value proposition is incredibly high if you're a music lover with eclectic taste. I use the service to listen to probably at least 40 new albums a month, and all it costs is about half the price of a single cd...per month. If I had to buy those albums I'd be spending at least $400 instead of $6. So yeah, the value's definitely there.
I've been thinking about this lately. A lot of people at work have no problem shelling out $12 a month for a satellite radio. The music and talk selection isn't really any better than what you'd get on AM/FM. What they're paying for is the availability. It's mainly because they travel a lot between FM "zones", and don't like their music interrupted. (And they like the web interface, which they pipe through the office PA). It's pricey (in my books, anyways), but they have no problem with the payments.
But they'd never go with a pay-to-access Napster-esque service.
The cost is about the same. ~$10/month. With both of them, you lose access to the music as soon as you stop playing. Both are DRM'd (poorly and can be analog-hole'd). Both require access to a network, though the S-Radio is easier to connect to in the car. (No reliable metro wifi in Toronto yet).
So why would they pay for one, but never for the other. After talking about it, the reason we all seemed to agree on is the promise of what's offered. The S-Radio people are right up front with it. "Pay us money. We'll pipe you channels of music. If you stop paying, we stop piping. It's a service we're offering. Okay?"
Whereas these music places are a bit shadier with their promise. "Pay use money, and you can download music, as much as you want.". They say it knowing full well that people associate "download music" as "I transfer a file to my computer and it's there forever, and I can play it however much I want". They think of iTunes, which instantly brings up the thought of "pay per song". So Napster et all are effectively trying to trick people into thinking that they're just like iTunes, but you get unlimited music rather than paying per track. They dance around the "lose access" part of the deal. It comes off as very, very scummy and untrustworthy-- and people don't like dealing with companies like that. After all, if they're going to lie right to your face about this (outright or by omission), then what else are they going to lie about? What else can't you trust them with? Are they REALLY unlimited? It's already too good to be true-- and isn't true at that-- so what else is going to screw you out of your cash?
The satellite radio company tell you right up front what you'll get, and they give it to you. They're business is music.
Napster (and other Music Services) tells you a veiled lie, and seems only intent on taking your money. They're business is exploiting people's desire for music. They don't care about the music at all.
"Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form."
That's one way to look at it. I see it a bit differently. I've subscribed to a music service for quite a while now. (Rhapsody, if anybody's curious.) There are a few benefits to it that are worth $10/mo. to me.
1.) I have access to all their music. Often I go find a bunch of new albums to listen to. That means if somebody recommends a song, for example, I'm listening to it like 20 seconds later.
2.) I don't have a big collection of music to take with my everywhere. Lots of people don't mind that, but I do. I have 3 different computers I constantly access. (Home desktop, home laptop, work desktop.) If I switch computers at work, I just reinstall Rhapsody and I'm hearing music again.
3.) Yes, if I terminate the service, I lose the music. On the flip side, there's lots of songs I used to listen to all the time that I don't anymore. This became wasteful, trying to manage all that. Here I just delete it from my list, and if I want it back like a year later, I just go hunt add it again. Before I was a packrat, keeping songs I didn't know if I really wanted to keep anymore. I can go buy them later if I really really want to make a long-term investment. I haven't done that in ages, though. My playlist today is far different than the one I had a year ago.
4.) This was sort of covered in the first point, but I'm always on the prowl to find new music. This service often gets new albums just as they're released. I pop them into my list and explore. I've found a ton of new music this way. One thing I didn't like about my music scouring before is that it was often tied to how much disposable money I had in a given month. I hated buying 3 or 4 albums and only getting a handful of interesting songs. In theory I could hear the clips and decide, but too many times I've not really liked a song until I've heard it a couple of times in its entirety. This makes me squeamish about buying a whole album.
5.) There's lots of stand-up comedy on this service. I use it to enterain myself at work from time to time during long monotonous days.
Subscription's not for everybody, but it's certainly not for nobody. Yeah, you've got a point. For me, the termination of services doesn't multiply the other values of it by 0. To me it's sorta like cable TV for music, only this is on-demand. I certainly like it better than satellite radio or other subscription services just for that reason. Considering all the new music I've found, I'd say there's plenty of value in it for some people, especially those with multiple computers or finicky music tastes.
"Can you say for certain that Rhapsody is going to be around next year? Or the year following? Say some lawsuit shows up, blows it out of the water and it ceases entirely."
Nope. Either I'll pack up and move to another service, or I'll go find the songs I really want to have and buy them.
"What are you left with? Not a thing. All your money that you spent on music is gone, and you have nothing to show for it."
Though I get what you're saying, that isn't quite true.
As in, I'm one of the few people for which this would be a bad idea, as I basically refuse to buy DRM'd media for my own use. Partly on principle, mostly because it won't work on Linux. But for most people, if you actually calculate it out, the DRM is the only bad part. It's otherwise a damned good model -- as others have pointed out, it costs about the same as satellite radio, but you get to pick what you want to listen to, and you can throw it all on a Zune (or any PlaysForSure player) and take it wherever
Uh, no, sorry. You pay for the files you buy from iTMS only once. Yes, the majority of the files have DRM, but it's really light-weight DRM that doesn't get in the way most of the time. Apple even encourages users to backup their purchased files.
Which is totally different... I can play it at home, in my car, at work.... oh wait. I can only play it on different machines if i'm on the same network, otherwise I have to take it on my ipod... which can only sync with one itunes... despite that I have multiple computers at home and work, each with a copy of itunes that cant play songs I've bought THROUGH ITUNES. Yeah, totally different.
But, what can I expect from someone with the name "Apple Acolyte". I'm typing this to you from a mac, btw... while wear
Why not just authorise your work and home computers? You're allowed five concurrent authorisations. Sure, it's an annoying DRM limitation. But it's fallacious to say you can only play the same song on multiple computers if they're on the same LAN. (Unless I'm missing something)
You might run into a couple of problems: 1. Zune only works with the Zune store. 2. Urge shut down last week, but at least they transferred their users over to Rhapsody.
I was using a Zen with Rhapsody up until a few weeks ago. I sold the Zen and canceled Rhapsody. In the end, I went back to my trust old iPod mini, but for the longest time I was contemplating switching to satellite radio. One thing I didn't like about the subscription service was having to manage the collection in order to keep up an update
The problem with Zune (aside from it's price) is that, like it's older (and nicer-to-use) brother, the Toshiba Gigabeat S (They are, quite literally, the same hardware internally- firmware and DRM are worse in the Zune is all) You can't transfer your music to your player without the software that comes WITH the player (or WMP if you're feeling maschistic- last revision that came over my desk didn't support UMS mode, though I would really hope they had fixed this by now) because neither are actual mp3/vorbic
Everyone I talk to refers to Napster in the past tense... "back when Napster was around"... "I used to use Napster all the time", etc. Rather than fight, it gave in. That's why users have moved on.
Napster far overestimated the value of its "brand". The Napster name was tied to the ability to get limitless music for free in a way that had the added bonus of being somewhat illicit (but not with huge monetary consequences that the RIAA has since tried to impose on P2P users in the years since). The Napster name was never, ever tied to the ideas of quality service, quality music, or anything else that would allow it to monetize the brand.
Napster never had a corporate reputation to bank on like they thought they did, they were only a tool to get free stuff. Then, when the music business came knocking, and everyone who used Napster started fighting, Napster itself folded like a cheap suit. They shut down and came back with a boneheaded business model: You can still get (some of) the same music you got for free before, but now it's crippled and you get to pay for it. I don't know anyone who thought even at the time that this would succeed.
Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example). I don't understand why Napster is even still in business.
Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example).
You know you can say "Zune" around here if you want.
The original Napster didn't overestimate the value of its brand. Roxio, which bought the name from the sharing people overestimated the value of the brand. The people called "Napster" now have no relation to the "Napster" that allowed music trading.
No, users have moved on because other technologies are better at transferring the files to you faster. Napster had two things going for it:
1. Centralized database
2. First popular sharing site of its kind.
Once the centralized database was gone and other methods popped up, there was no reason to stick with it. Napster is nothing more than a name and a lame character in a movie.
I don't want to sound like a broken record but...
imeem.com has gone one step further than #1 - centralized database *and* centralised data - all the mp3s get uploaded to the site and are instantly accessible to anyone else on imeem.
as for whether it's popular, it's top 100 on Alexa but we all know those stats mean nothing.
It' not that music subscriptions are overrated, Napster is. They're not in the position to do what they're doing. Subscriptions are worthless if you can't take them with you on the device(s) you use.
Do you know who's in that position. Apple. I bet my money if Apple introduced subscription model that works with iTunes (Win/Mac), iPhone, and iPod, then it'll be largely successful.
Napster just have a somewhat recognizable name and a funny cat logo.
Meh... Even with Apple, I'm not sure they could make music subscriptions work. I think the real problem is that people just don't want a subscription model for music. They want to have a collection that they can keep perpetually, and not a temporary license.
You know what I was listening to on my way to work today? Bob Dylan, Blonde on Blonde. You know how long i've had that CD? Neither do I, but it's been a while. Now, do I want to spend $20 a month in order to keep listening to it? Absolutely not.
Well the way I see it is this: buying music is good for times when you want to be able to keep the song, but subscriptions are good if you want to be able to listen to a bunch of different stuff that you don't necessarily want to keep. I have had guilty pleasure songs that I want to listen to over and over for 2 weeks, and then I never want to hear it again. Subscriptions would be great for that.
So I feel like the ideal would be some kind of a hybrid service. Like, let's say you pay a nominal fee for a
It makes sense - why pay for music, when it's so easy to download the pirated stuff for free? iTunes has the people who aren't computer savvy, eMusic has people who like non-RIAA music that can't easily be found, Napster didn't really have a niche.
That said, the actual service (and Yahoo! Music, a competitor) is/was really awesome, for who enjoy listening to a huge selection of music - and have an always-on Internet connection - and have their stereos hooked up to a computer. I guess it was a niche, it was just too small of one.
I really hope this doesn't mean Napster (and Yahoo and the like) are taking away the "all you can eat" subscription service.
I am a Napster customer with the all you can eat model and I LOVE IT.
I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc. This buck-for-a-song model has existed for far too long and I have only bought four songs this way, through iTunes, and all four were immediately burned to CD and ripped back so I could stip off that horrible DRM.
So with the buck-a-song model it made me do something that probably made RIAA very happy--I bought CDs. I'm sorry, but on a CD I get songs for less than a buck each (while there are some I won't like, there will also be gems I may never have heard had I not bought the CD) plus you get cover art, a media that's higher sound quality than a digital downloaded file. It just didn't make sense to me.
Then look at Napster. Suddenly I had a LEGAL world of music open up to me. I was able to explore the libraries of artists who are somewhat less popular. I'd never have spent $12 for their CDs, but a "Download Album" button had me pulling down every song I could find and listening to it.
Moreover, it is VERY easy to strip the DRM from a Napster WMA. I am an iPod user and Napster WMAs won't work with an iPod (though I wish Apple would relent and add that as a firmware/software upgrade to the iPod). So I use FairUse4WM and, bam, now I have MP3s that play on my iPod. I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s. I'm only playing while I'm paying, so I'm playing by their rules.
This model has weened me from buying CDs altogether. I used to have a $200-$300 per month CD habit. I'm not kidding on that, I have over 3000 CDs and just kept buying every month. But with Napster I don't need CDs, I just get what I need from Napster. It's saving me THOUSANDS of dollars every year.
And my wife and I have very different music tastes. She used to not get music she liked becuase she didn't want to spend as much on CDs as I did. Now for one low monthly fee we both have all the music we want.
Sure, sometimes Napster is frustrating. I was looking for some songs on there that were "album only", "purchase only", or not available at all. It's not a silver bullet. But it is DAMN close.
If Napster doesn't see it as a growth business, that's because WMAs aren't a growth format. If you could do a subscription format that worked on iPods natively then you would have a model that would grow with each iPod sold. PlaysForSure??? If you're basing your business model off of Zune sales, well good luck with that!
But anyone who reads/. on a regular basis should know how to strip DRM from any file using free tools. Given that can be done so easily, I really think we should spread the word to our less tech-inclined friends and help these all you can eat services become a "growth model" lest they go away and RIAA can roll in the money of a buck per song again.
You seem to have done very well with the Napster business model. Unfortunately there are not enough people such as yourself to sustain Napster in the long term. Also, since you are stripping the DRM from the WMAs, you are in fact violating the terms of service and Napster would be put out of business if everyone did that (they would lose access to the music).
Enjoy it while it lasts.... as we all did with the original Napster.
No, what happens is that the entire music library gets downloaded, eventually, stripped, and shared.
Then no one would subscribe to Napster, and they would die.
Why doesn't this happen with, say, iTunes? It too will probably happen, but because you have to pay so much more ($1 per song, nominally), downloading and sharing the entire library will cost about $3b, while downloading and sharing all of Napster will probably cost only a couple thousand.
So, what you're saying is that Napster is a great deal, as long as you use it in a way that violates the EULA and circumvents the DMCA.
Exactly like the old Napster, except that you're now paying a monthly fee to do so.
I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc.
Three statements in one sentence always leads to problems. The WMA files from Napster, as you later admit yourselve, are DRMed and run on only so many systems. Your claims of the DRM being easy to strip are meaningless, you can do it with equal ease with iTunes music. IF you are willing to violate US law as a US citizen, then both formats can be easily converted to non-drm formats (mp3) that plays on the fast majority of systems.
So we are left with your complaint that music at iTunes costs 0.99 per song.
How does this cost work out in the long run. The iTunes song is yours for "life". If napster closes, there goes your music collection. ALL your downloaded music, GONE. For good.
Ah but your ripped it (and made yourselve a criminal by doing so) although you do claim that if you stop paying the subscription, you will delete those MP3's. Right. Sure, I believe that. There must be an honest person among us. Perhaps you are it.
But what if you don't cancel, but Napster goes out of business. YOU may still be willing to pay, but you can't. Bye bye collection.
As for spreading the good word, IT IS AGAINST US LAW and the RIAA does prosecute people. You may not agree with the law, but civil disobedience sucks when you are the one being made an example off.
I just wish you had left the DRM part out of your argument and concentrated simply on value for money. Is 15 bucks per month enough to rent music (It isn't unlike a library card and I think most of accept that) OR do we pay perhaps more per song but it is our song.
Currently both models suck. 99 cents for a few megabytes of data is idiotic next to the cost of production. Loosing all your songs because a company goes out of business in a format that doesn't work on the majority of players sucks as well.
Frankly the entire industry is screwed up. The music industry has become so obsesses with fat profits, that they are unable to see that by simply lowering the price they can make theft totally undesirable.
Say that for 15 bucks per month you could download ANY music you wanted in the format you desired. WHY BOTHER WITH FILESHARING THEN? Oh sure, there will be small percentage who will do so anyway, but it should be almost trivial to get most of the western world to sign up just by putting ALL music in the system, ALL means ALL, including "bootlegs" classical music and rare recordings.
how is that working for you. I had to switch to using a combination of drmdbg and freeme2 or drm2wm to crack stuff. Is Napster still using the really old WM10 setup?? That's been cracked for a long time and microsoft cautioned everyone to move to WM11 WMA encryption as it's harder to beak... well until drmdbg came out:-)
"Moreover, it is VERY easy to strip the DRM from a Napster WMA. I am an iPod user and Napster WMAs won't work with an iPod.... So I use FairUse4WM and, bam, now I have MP3s that play on my iPod."
So, you love the service, but really only love how easy it is to get around their limitations?
"I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s."
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt on that, but how many other people honestly keep their legally-purchased mp3's completely separated from their less-than-legal mp3 files, so they can delete them at a moment's notice?
So, I don't doubt that you've made very good use of a subscription model, but I think your example also shows why it doesn't work very well for most people, esp. if they don't have the expertise to work around the DRM, and why it doesn't work very well for the music industry, if most people don't share your scruples about deleting the music after the subscription ends.
Well, I have a music subscription to Yahoo and am completely addicted to music new and old. I also work at a computer all day where I am always listening to music. I absolutely can't understand why anyone who truly loves music and has eclectic tastes wouldn't do this. For $7 a month, I have access to several million songs of multiple genres. I don't mind paying for nonDRM'd music, but with all of the music I'm listening to on Yahoo, it would cost me about $5000 in downloads. It would take me being a subscri
Was that it didn't work easily. I'd happily pay $10 a month to listen to all music, everywhere. No qualms at all. And so I tried Napster.
But making it work with my various different music devices was just too much of a pain. I didn't mind the DRM per se - I very much mind that there isn't DRM that works seamlessly across a whole range of devices.
$10 a month to listen to music anywhere - no problem. $10 a month to listen to music at my computer - no chance.
Is that rumblings that they plan from exiting the subscriber music business?
I have one friend who really enjoys Napster's subscription service probably have 1000 songs he listens to. If Napster were to shut down the service I think there would be a lot of very unhappy customers.
The OP is perhaps mystified because he is expressing an opinion from 2005 as shown here [washingtonpost.com]. Clearly mobile is where the money is, as Steve Jobs can tell you. Their English [napster.com] compatibles page is not too exciting but take a look at NTT DoCoMo's lineup [napster.jp] (Japanese). DoCoMo sells advanced phones in Japan with Napster built in. Actually, the brand seems on that page to be "Napster x Tower Records" which will make you either gleeful or sick.. like the RIAA is selling Napster or vice versa. Phones providing unlimited songs it seems are made by several manufacturers (list [napster.jp]).
There are two more data points to note.
1. The monthly flat fee format is very popular at least in Japan. In particular, ring tones are a big business, but also all kinds of other media like games, weather reports, and what looks compelling to me is NaviTime which tells you the combination of train and other transportation to get you to your destination in the shortest time. Flat fees though are usually I think 300 yen per month though (for a subscription to downloadable Java games from a game manufacturer). Perhaps you can get more money if bundled when you buy the phone.
2. The HSDPA [wikipedia.org] high speed data network rollout is marketed to people as the way to deliver songs to your phone. Personally I wanted to go to the Internet at high speed but it turns out (at least until sometime in the future) that this is only within the carrier's network, perhaps only to registered sites. So a Napster-like unlimited service is very useful for HSDPA rollout especially for carriers (all of them) who just want to stuff things down your throat and could care less about connecting you the rest of the world.
I should note two things: it may be possible to get out of the network but you will go broke, and also the docomo person told me they might come out with a pcmcia card or some such that could do it. Anyway I'm waiting for the model supposed to come out this month or so that can also do roaming (World Wind service) in the U.S. (the last country to be added it seems).
Or canny? The mobile music revenue market is 20x the size of the "legal download" music market currently dominated ~75% by Apple with itunes. It's even bigger if you factor in satellite delivery subscription models such as Sirius/XM. Why do you think Apple is so eager to sell you a ringtone for $2?
Mainstream music coming out these days is overrated
You're completely right. There are too many manufactured bands around at the moment singing covers of covers and these talentless nobodies being backed by the Simon Cowell hype juggernaut.
Meanwhile a good band will turn up, only to be ignored because everyone's paying attention to a group that will be forgotten in 6 month's time.
And that's why I'm not buying or listening to your song, Leona Lewis.
Mainstream music coming out these days is overrated
Agreed, but we should be careful to make the distinction between new mainstream music, and all new music. There is good stuff still coming out, and (as you stated) a lot of it falls in the "independent" category. That said, I think that the various music subscription services actually help provide better visibility to artists that are off the beaten path.
For me, I LOVE my Sirius Satellite Radio and I've been turned on to several artists that I likely would never have heard of had it not been fo
Seriously, what's the big deal? At least that's what I thought until I heard the Star Trek TOS Red Alert ringtone.. Ah yes, that one is reserved for calls from work...
You're forgetting The Imperial March [youtube.com] for your significant other...
I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Interesting)
Big Business (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.
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Subscriptions in many cases aren't valuable to the end user, as you take music with you, yet video's aren't very useful while driving down the road.
You subscribe to a newspaper as it changes every day. You subscribe to TV as you have to sit down and watch it. How many people sit down and just listen to music?
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Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.
I was specifically referring to music subscription services. There is a much more popular alternative to music download subscription services - iTMS - and it succeeds where these services fail. If there were only music subscription services available and no iTMS, they would much more popular. But the fact is people don't like paying monthly fees for services, yet they will if there's a lack of competition in a given market. I'd prefer not to pay any monthly fees for many common consumer items, but I end up
Are 14 Million People Chomping? (Score:3, Insightful)
I am having trouble parsing your words "fail". The vast bulk of the media marketplace in the United States and even the world is based on subscription revenue. Compared with these, Apple's revenue from single-licence sales is a blip. It's big when considered against the declining revenues of the other single-charge retailers who usually package their content onto plastic disks, but it's still a very slow growing market, subject to random, huge di
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The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer.
That's because the college students at schools Napster has agreements with (no doubt by scaring them with file-sharing legal FUD) are FORCED to pay for a Napster subscription as a part of their technology fees and since they don't take classes during the summer, those subscriptions stop. It's not because they stop using the service, it's because they don't have to pay for it anymore. And the small percentage who used the
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Nobody claimed that you were buying music. Music subscriptions offers you legal access to more music than you can possibly buy with the same amount of money per month in your lifetime.
If you want subscriptions where you keep your tracks, then eMusic is the way to go, but that limits you to about 30 tracks a month.
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Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Insightful)
But they'd never go with a pay-to-access Napster-esque service.
The cost is about the same. ~$10/month. With both of them, you lose access to the music as soon as you stop playing. Both are DRM'd (poorly and can be analog-hole'd). Both require access to a network, though the S-Radio is easier to connect to in the car. (No reliable metro wifi in Toronto yet).
So why would they pay for one, but never for the other. After talking about it, the reason we all seemed to agree on is the promise of what's offered. The S-Radio people are right up front with it. "Pay us money. We'll pipe you channels of music. If you stop paying, we stop piping. It's a service we're offering. Okay?"
Whereas these music places are a bit shadier with their promise. "Pay use money, and you can download music, as much as you want.". They say it knowing full well that people associate "download music" as "I transfer a file to my computer and it's there forever, and I can play it however much I want". They think of iTunes, which instantly brings up the thought of "pay per song". So Napster et all are effectively trying to trick people into thinking that they're just like iTunes, but you get unlimited music rather than paying per track. They dance around the "lose access" part of the deal. It comes off as very, very scummy and untrustworthy-- and people don't like dealing with companies like that. After all, if they're going to lie right to your face about this (outright or by omission), then what else are they going to lie about? What else can't you trust them with? Are they REALLY unlimited? It's already too good to be true-- and isn't true at that-- so what else is going to screw you out of your cash?
The satellite radio company tell you right up front what you'll get, and they give it to you. They're business is music.
Napster (and other Music Services) tells you a veiled lie, and seems only intent on taking your money. They're business is exploiting people's desire for music. They don't care about the music at all.
THAT'S why they will always, always fail.
Parent
Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Insightful)
That's one way to look at it. I see it a bit differently. I've subscribed to a music service for quite a while now. (Rhapsody, if anybody's curious.) There are a few benefits to it that are worth $10/mo. to me.
1.) I have access to all their music. Often I go find a bunch of new albums to listen to. That means if somebody recommends a song, for example, I'm listening to it like 20 seconds later.
2.) I don't have a big collection of music to take with my everywhere. Lots of people don't mind that, but I do. I have 3 different computers I constantly access. (Home desktop, home laptop, work desktop.) If I switch computers at work, I just reinstall Rhapsody and I'm hearing music again.
3.) Yes, if I terminate the service, I lose the music. On the flip side, there's lots of songs I used to listen to all the time that I don't anymore. This became wasteful, trying to manage all that. Here I just delete it from my list, and if I want it back like a year later, I just go hunt add it again. Before I was a packrat, keeping songs I didn't know if I really wanted to keep anymore. I can go buy them later if I really really want to make a long-term investment. I haven't done that in ages, though. My playlist today is far different than the one I had a year ago.
4.) This was sort of covered in the first point, but I'm always on the prowl to find new music. This service often gets new albums just as they're released. I pop them into my list and explore. I've found a ton of new music this way. One thing I didn't like about my music scouring before is that it was often tied to how much disposable money I had in a given month. I hated buying 3 or 4 albums and only getting a handful of interesting songs. In theory I could hear the clips and decide, but too many times I've not really liked a song until I've heard it a couple of times in its entirety. This makes me squeamish about buying a whole album.
5.) There's lots of stand-up comedy on this service. I use it to enterain myself at work from time to time during long monotonous days.
Subscription's not for everybody, but it's certainly not for nobody. Yeah, you've got a point. For me, the termination of services doesn't multiply the other values of it by 0. To me it's sorta like cable TV for music, only this is on-demand. I certainly like it better than satellite radio or other subscription services just for that reason. Considering all the new music I've found, I'd say there's plenty of value in it for some people, especially those with multiple computers or finicky music tastes.
Parent
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Nope. Either I'll pack up and move to another service, or I'll go find the songs I really want to have and buy them.
"What are you left with? Not a thing. All your money that you spent on music is gone, and you have nothing to show for it."
Though I get what you're saying, that isn't quite true.
- I have found a LOT of music I wouldn't have
I'm the exception. (Score:3, Interesting)
But for most people, if you actually calculate it out, the DRM is the only bad part. It's otherwise a damned good model -- as others have pointed out, it costs about the same as satellite radio, but you get to pick what you want to listen to, and you can throw it all on a Zune (or any PlaysForSure player) and take it wherever
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Yeah, totally different.
But, what can I expect from someone with the name "Apple Acolyte". I'm typing this to you from a mac, btw... while wear
Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
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1. Zune only works with the Zune store.
2. Urge shut down last week, but at least they transferred their users over to Rhapsody.
I was using a Zen with Rhapsody up until a few weeks ago. I sold the Zen and canceled Rhapsody. In the end, I went back to my trust old iPod mini, but for the longest time I was contemplating switching to satellite radio. One thing I didn't like about the subscription service was having to manage the collection in order to keep up an update
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Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Who even uses Napster anymore? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Who even uses Napster anymore? (Score:5, Insightful)
Napster never had a corporate reputation to bank on like they thought they did, they were only a tool to get free stuff. Then, when the music business came knocking, and everyone who used Napster started fighting, Napster itself folded like a cheap suit. They shut down and came back with a boneheaded business model: You can still get (some of) the same music you got for free before, but now it's crippled and you get to pay for it. I don't know anyone who thought even at the time that this would succeed.
Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example). I don't understand why Napster is even still in business.
Parent
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You know you can say "Zune" around here if you want.
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No, users have moved on because other technologies are better at transferring the files to you faster. Napster had two things going for it:
1. Centralized database
2. First popular sharing site of its kind.
Once the centralized database was gone and other methods popped up, there was no reason to stick with it. Napster is nothing more than a name and a lame character in a movie.
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Napster is overrated (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you know who's in that position. Apple. I bet my money if Apple introduced subscription model that works with iTunes (Win/Mac), iPhone, and iPod, then it'll be largely successful.
Napster just have a somewhat recognizable name and a funny cat logo.
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Meh... Even with Apple, I'm not sure they could make music subscriptions work. I think the real problem is that people just don't want a subscription model for music. They want to have a collection that they can keep perpetually, and not a temporary license.
You know what I was listening to on my way to work today? Bob Dylan, Blonde on Blonde. You know how long i've had that CD? Neither do I, but it's been a while. Now, do I want to spend $20 a month in order to keep listening to it? Absolutely not.
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Well the way I see it is this: buying music is good for times when you want to be able to keep the song, but subscriptions are good if you want to be able to listen to a bunch of different stuff that you don't necessarily want to keep. I have had guilty pleasure songs that I want to listen to over and over for 2 weeks, and then I never want to hear it again. Subscriptions would be great for that.
So I feel like the ideal would be some kind of a hybrid service. Like, let's say you pay a nominal fee for a
Makes Sense (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, the actual service (and Yahoo! Music, a competitor) is/was really awesome, for who enjoy listening to a huge selection of music - and have an always-on Internet connection - and have their stereos hooked up to a computer. I guess it was a niche, it was just too small of one.
idear (Score:2)
Would be fun though.
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Napster--Very Worth It (Score:5, Interesting)
I am a Napster customer with the all you can eat model and I LOVE IT.
I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc. This buck-for-a-song model has existed for far too long and I have only bought four songs this way, through iTunes, and all four were immediately burned to CD and ripped back so I could stip off that horrible DRM.
So with the buck-a-song model it made me do something that probably made RIAA very happy--I bought CDs. I'm sorry, but on a CD I get songs for less than a buck each (while there are some I won't like, there will also be gems I may never have heard had I not bought the CD) plus you get cover art, a media that's higher sound quality than a digital downloaded file. It just didn't make sense to me.
Then look at Napster. Suddenly I had a LEGAL world of music open up to me. I was able to explore the libraries of artists who are somewhat less popular. I'd never have spent $12 for their CDs, but a "Download Album" button had me pulling down every song I could find and listening to it.
Moreover, it is VERY easy to strip the DRM from a Napster WMA. I am an iPod user and Napster WMAs won't work with an iPod (though I wish Apple would relent and add that as a firmware/software upgrade to the iPod). So I use FairUse4WM and, bam, now I have MP3s that play on my iPod. I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s. I'm only playing while I'm paying, so I'm playing by their rules.
This model has weened me from buying CDs altogether. I used to have a $200-$300 per month CD habit. I'm not kidding on that, I have over 3000 CDs and just kept buying every month. But with Napster I don't need CDs, I just get what I need from Napster. It's saving me THOUSANDS of dollars every year.
And my wife and I have very different music tastes. She used to not get music she liked becuase she didn't want to spend as much on CDs as I did. Now for one low monthly fee we both have all the music we want.
Sure, sometimes Napster is frustrating. I was looking for some songs on there that were "album only", "purchase only", or not available at all. It's not a silver bullet. But it is DAMN close.
If Napster doesn't see it as a growth business, that's because WMAs aren't a growth format. If you could do a subscription format that worked on iPods natively then you would have a model that would grow with each iPod sold. PlaysForSure??? If you're basing your business model off of Zune sales, well good luck with that!
But anyone who reads
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Enjoy it while it lasts.... as we all did with the original Napster.
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Then no one would subscribe to Napster, and they would die.
Why doesn't this happen with, say, iTunes? It too will probably happen, but because you have to pay so much more ($1 per song, nominally), downloading and sharing the entire library will cost about $3b, while downloading and sharing all of Napster will probably cost only a couple thousand.
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Exactly like the old Napster, except that you're now paying a monthly fee to do so.
What an odd post, why focus on DRM? (Score:5, Insightful)
I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc.
Three statements in one sentence always leads to problems. The WMA files from Napster, as you later admit yourselve, are DRMed and run on only so many systems. Your claims of the DRM being easy to strip are meaningless, you can do it with equal ease with iTunes music. IF you are willing to violate US law as a US citizen, then both formats can be easily converted to non-drm formats (mp3) that plays on the fast majority of systems.
So we are left with your complaint that music at iTunes costs 0.99 per song.
How does this cost work out in the long run. The iTunes song is yours for "life". If napster closes, there goes your music collection. ALL your downloaded music, GONE. For good.
Ah but your ripped it (and made yourselve a criminal by doing so) although you do claim that if you stop paying the subscription, you will delete those MP3's. Right. Sure, I believe that. There must be an honest person among us. Perhaps you are it.
But what if you don't cancel, but Napster goes out of business. YOU may still be willing to pay, but you can't. Bye bye collection.
As for spreading the good word, IT IS AGAINST US LAW and the RIAA does prosecute people. You may not agree with the law, but civil disobedience sucks when you are the one being made an example off.
I just wish you had left the DRM part out of your argument and concentrated simply on value for money. Is 15 bucks per month enough to rent music (It isn't unlike a library card and I think most of accept that) OR do we pay perhaps more per song but it is our song.
Currently both models suck. 99 cents for a few megabytes of data is idiotic next to the cost of production. Loosing all your songs because a company goes out of business in a format that doesn't work on the majority of players sucks as well.
Frankly the entire industry is screwed up. The music industry has become so obsesses with fat profits, that they are unable to see that by simply lowering the price they can make theft totally undesirable.
Say that for 15 bucks per month you could download ANY music you wanted in the format you desired. WHY BOTHER WITH FILESHARING THEN? Oh sure, there will be small percentage who will do so anyway, but it should be almost trivial to get most of the western world to sign up just by putting ALL music in the system, ALL means ALL, including "bootlegs" classical music and rare recordings.
Parent
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Re:Napster--Very Worth It (Score:4, Insightful)
So, you love the service, but really only love how easy it is to get around their limitations?
"I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s."
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt on that, but how many other people honestly keep their legally-purchased mp3's completely separated from their less-than-legal mp3 files, so they can delete them at a moment's notice?
So, I don't doubt that you've made very good use of a subscription model, but I think your example also shows why it doesn't work very well for most people, esp. if they don't have the expertise to work around the DRM, and why it doesn't work very well for the music industry, if most people don't share your scruples about deleting the music after the subscription ends.
Parent
What's so wrong with subscription? (Score:2, Insightful)
The problem (Score:2)
But making it work with my various different music devices was just too much of a pain. I didn't mind the DRM per se - I very much mind that there isn't DRM that works seamlessly across a whole range of devices.
$10 a month to listen to music anywhere - no problem.
$10 a month to listen to music at my computer - no chance.
Exit strategy? (Score:3, Interesting)
I have one friend who really enjoys Napster's subscription service probably have 1000 songs he listens to. If Napster were to shut down the service I think there would be a lot of very unhappy customers.
Gee, sounds like really solid research (Score:2)
What the hell does that mean? What's the basis for this supposed drop? Sounds like fluff to me.
How true (Score:2)
They already are in Japan (Score:3, Informative)
There are two more data points to note.
1. The monthly flat fee format is very popular at least in Japan. In particular, ring tones are a big business, but also all kinds of other media like games, weather reports, and what looks compelling to me is NaviTime which tells you the combination of train and other transportation to get you to your destination in the shortest time. Flat fees though are usually I think 300 yen per month though (for a subscription to downloadable Java games from a game manufacturer). Perhaps you can get more money if bundled when you buy the phone.
2. The HSDPA [wikipedia.org] high speed data network rollout is marketed to people as the way to deliver songs to your phone. Personally I wanted to go to the Internet at high speed but it turns out (at least until sometime in the future) that this is only within the carrier's network, perhaps only to registered sites. So a Napster-like unlimited service is very useful for HSDPA rollout especially for carriers (all of them) who just want to stuff things down your throat and could care less about connecting you the rest of the world.
I should note two things: it may be possible to get out of the network but you will go broke, and also the docomo person told me they might come out with a pcmcia card or some such that could do it. Anyway I'm waiting for the model supposed to come out this month or so that can also do roaming (World Wind service) in the U.S. (the last country to be added it seems).
Mobile Is Huge (Score:2)
Or canny? The mobile music revenue market is 20x the size of the "legal download" music market currently dominated ~75% by Apple with itunes. It's even bigger if you factor in satellite delivery subscription models such as Sirius/XM. Why do you think Apple is so eager to sell you a ringtone for $2?
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You're completely right. There are too many manufactured bands around at the moment singing covers of covers and these talentless nobodies being backed by the Simon Cowell hype juggernaut.
Meanwhile a good band will turn up, only to be ignored because everyone's paying attention to a group that will be forgotten in 6 month's time.
And that's why I'm not buying or listening to your song, Leona Lewis.
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Mainstream music coming out these days is overrated
Agreed, but we should be careful to make the distinction between new mainstream music, and all new music. There is good stuff still coming out, and (as you stated) a lot of it falls in the "independent" category. That said, I think that the various music subscription services actually help provide better visibility to artists that are off the beaten path.
For me, I LOVE my Sirius Satellite Radio and I've been turned on to several artists that I likely would never have heard of had it not been fo
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You're forgetting The Imperial March [youtube.com] for your significant other...
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Umm.. that's called buying music.